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Absolutely! It didn't work that way for recent presidential elections, though. The prior odds weren't always 50:50, but they were well within the range of "both sides could win" and didn't go outside that.


In the case of an election, a 50:50 forecast is a clear reminder to the wise of the importance of voting, no matter how certain the outcome might seem from the necessarily limited perspective of your acquaintances and your consumption of possibly (or likely) biased news media.


If a modern US election went far outside that that would just mean some fool was burning a huge amount of money and probably to no purpose as it would cause a response from donors on the other side who would like an outcome but also aren't going to throw money away.


It's less likely for the presidency, but for other offices, it's often the case that an incumbent has only token competition.




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